-ine

-ine is a suffix used in chemistry to denote two kinds of substance. The first is a chemically basic and alkaloidal substance. It was proposed by Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac in an editorial accompanying a paper by Friedrich Sertürner describing the isolation of the alkaloid "morphium", which was subsequently renamed to "morphine".[1] Examples include quinine, morphine and guanidine.[2] The second usage is to denote a hydrocarbon of the second degree of unsaturation. Examples include hexine and heptine.[2] With simple hydrocarbons, this usage is identical to the IUPAC suffix -yne.

The suffix is usually pronounced either /iːn/ or /ɪn/ depending on the word it appears in and the accent of the speaker. In a few words (for example, quinine and strychnine), the /aɪn/ sound is normal in some accents. Gasoline ends with /iːn/; glycerine more often with /ɪn/ than with /iːn/.

It is noteworthy also that some elements of the periodic table (namely the halogens, in the Group 17) have this suffix: fluorine (F), chlorine (Cl), bromine (Br), iodine (I) and astatine (At), ending which was continued in the artificially created tennessine (Ts).

The suffix -in (/ɪn/) is etymologically related and overlaps in usage with -ine. Many proteins and lipids have names ending with -in: for example, the enzymes pepsin and trypsin, the hormones insulin and gastrin, and the lipids stearin (stearine) and olein.

References
  1. Sneader W. (2005). Drug Discovery: A History, pp. 90-91. Wiley.
  2. "Definition -ine". Centre for Cancer Education. Archived from the original on 2009-08-05. Retrieved 2008-03-29.
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